History
America is a land of many horticultural societies. The oldest, The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, dates back to 1827, but national “special plant” societies are much younger. Only a few, like the Rose Society, Dahlia Society and Peony Society, were active before 1920, when the American Iris Society was organized.

(…) New members, and particularly new officers, need to know: Why the Society was started; how it was started; who started it and what kind of people they were; what they tried to, and what they were able to accomplish; what, in the early years, particularly, they were not able to undertake or to carry out successfully.

Founding of the AIS: A New York Storyby Anner M. WhiteheadIn
the words of Dr. N. L. Britton, Director of the New York Botanical
Garden at Bronx Park, who welcomed those attending the founding meeting
of the American Iris Society at eleven o'clock in the morning on January
29, 1920, the weather that day was "arctic." This must have caused the
organizers great trepidation as they in planning had only dared hope for
enough attendance, perhaps two dozen enthusiastic folks, to bring the
proposed group to life, and foul weather might endanger their dream.
Various illnesses inevitably make the rounds in January, and did so in
1920 as well; indeed, Dr. Henry Allen Gleason, the Assistant Director of
the Garden, who was supposed to do the welcoming that day, was sick at
home. This was surely a great disappointment to him, and to others, for
his support had been generous, and he had been instrumental in planning
the new group, in conferring upon it sterling legitimacy, and in
pointing it in the right direction.

But neither illness, nor inclement weather, nor lingering hangovers, for
Prohibition also became effective January 29, 1920, could quell the
momentum toward founding the AIS. This momentum had been growing for the
past year, or five years, or ten, or even twenty years, as one might
count it, and upwards of sixty intrepid souls from several parts of the
country and diverse segments of the horticultural world answered the
private entreaties and public announcements which had gone out over
previous weeks, and trudged through those arctic conditions to the
meeting. They came to enjoy the company of like minded folks, and to
organize a national iris society, and when they left the Garden later
that day, they had one.

John C. Wister, a young landscape architect who played an important role
in planning the AIS and became its first president, often said that
America's rebirth of interest in garden irises was attributable to
Bertrand Farr's work, specifically his importing a large collection of
irises from England and issuing elegant illustrated commercial catalogs
beginning in 1908, but most especially his sending an exhibition of
irises, including some new ones he had raised from bee pods, to the Pan
Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915, where the
display received a Gold Medal and was seen by many visitors. Undoubtedly
this is part of the story, although many other people were also working
with irises in Europe and America well before 1915. These included J. N.
Gerard of New Jersey, who wrote a series of important articles for the
distinguished magazine Garden and Forest and encouraged hybridizer E. B.
Williamson's early work; Sidney Mitchell of Canada and, later,
California; George Peterson, nurseryman, of Chicago; Jennett Dean of
Southern California, pioneer iris hybridizer and commercial importer of
new French originations; and, in the Midwest, the Rev. C. S. Harrison,
nurseryman and author, and the Sass brothers of Nebraska. Grace
Sturtevant, who won highly publicized prizes from the Massachusetts
Horticultural Society in 1917 for her introductions, had also been very
active. Many of these people knew each other, or knew of each other, and
much of their activity reflected a renewed international interest in
irises in the wake of the work of Sir Michael Foster and his circle in
England, work which culminated in the 1913 publication of William Rickatson Dykes' botanical study, The Genus Iris. In other words, if the
seeds sown at the organizational meeting for the AIS grew like Jack's
beanstalk, and they did, it is because those seeds fell on well prepared
ground.

The months preceding the meeting saw some public literary activity
concerning irises, possibly well coordinated public literary activity.
B. Y. Morrison of the United States Department of Agriculture in
Washington, who was enormously knowledgeable, published several
informative articles, including one in the upscale magazine Country Life for June 1919, called "Irises for all Gardens." This ran to sixteen
oversized pages and featured scrumptious watercolor illustrations, some
reproduced from Mr. Dykes' tome. Along with Robert Sturtevant, Grace
Sturtevant's younger brother, a landscape architect who had worked in
the Olmsted firm before the War, Mr. Morrison also sent several
intriguing shorter pieces to The Garden Magazine, an influential
horticultural journal published by Doubleday, Page and Company, of
Garden City, New York. These pieces fostered a growing dialogue on
irises in the press, and, in September 1919, Leonard Barron, editor of The Garden Magazine, who would later attend the organizational meeting,
published a collection of letters, including one from Arthur Bliss of
England, originator of the famous new iris "Dominion", under the
intriguing and energizing heading, "World-Wide is the Interest in Iris."

The Flower Grower, published in Calcium, New York, by Madison Cooper,
less glossy and sophisticated, perhaps, than the aforementioned
magazines but certainly no less earnest in its approach to gardening,
also carried articles on irises. In early January 1920, it published the
formal announcement of the upcoming meeting in Bronx Park, "The Proposed
American Iris Society," written by Grace Sturtevant, who spoke of the
recent increase in varieties of garden Irises, and the accompanying need
to make good information about them available to the public. She said:
"It is high time that some central body should gather together
information on Iris matters whether it is the history of our garden
favorites, the records of our present varieties or the opportunities for
the future." Additionally, she shared the very exciting news that Dr.
Gleason and the New York Botanical Garden had suggested a cooperative
scheme of Trial Grounds with the proposed new society. Now the gestating
AIS had a distinguished sponsor, a highly respected public face, and a
clearly articulated mission of service.

In his article on the founding of the AIS published in the January 1970,
"Golden Anniversary” issue of the Bulletin, Mr. Wister tells us that the
invitation to the meeting which was mailed directly to selected members
of the horticultural community was written by Dr. Gleason himself, and
signed by several prominent parties, including James Boyd, president of
the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, who would chair the upcoming
meeting. Others were Lee R. Bonnewitz of Ohio, nurseryman and president
of the American Peony Society, founded in Brooklyn in 1903; W. F.
Christman, secretary of the Northwestern Peony and Iris Society, founded
in Minneapolis in 1917; Mrs. Francis King of the Garden Club of America,
social activist and writer; Miss Sturtevant; Mr. Morrison; and Mr.
Wister himself. This letter proposed several goals for the new society,
among them compiling lists of varieties; undertaking research on pests
and diseases; collecting cultural information for different climates;
and promoting popular interest in irises through shows, articles, and
lectures. In preparation for the gathering, Mr. Wister also conferred
with Frank Presby, a prominent New Jersey businessman and
horticulturist, about the legal and business aspects of the undertaking
and a preliminary "constitution" was drafted for discussion at the
organizational meeting, where, article by article, and amendment by
amendment, it was pondered and polished.

Many people instrumental in founding the AIS came from the world of
Peonies. In addition to those mentioned were Bertrand Farr; Mrs. Edward
Harding, author of a recently published book on the subject; and
Professor A. P. Saunders, a chemistry teacher at Hamilton College in
Clinton, New York, who edited the Peony society's Bulletin and who was
to take the minutes at the meeting on January 29. All were personally
interested in irises as well as Peonies, of course, but there was also a
perception that they might do for the iris what had been done for the
Peony earlier in the century when Mr. Farr and others, working closely
with Cornell University, had planted trial gardens at Ithaca and, over a
course of several years, sorted out the egregiously muddled names so
that the genus could be vigorously promoted to the horticultural public.
A lot had been learned through that process, and it was thought that
much the same sort of thing could, and should, be accomplished for the
iris. Indeed, as A. P. Saunders recorded that day, Dr. A. C. Beal, head
of the Department of Horticulture, brought to the meeting "a plea to
establish at Cornell a trial garden of the Society, and after long
discussion on this matter it was turned over to the Board of Directors
with directions to cooperate in every way possible with Cornell, but to
establish the complete collection at Bronx Park." Professors Saunders
and Beal, along with Robert Sturtevant, who was elected the AIS’ first
Secretary, were also responsible for drafting the final version of the "constitution", which provided for six Regions with vice presidents. The
first RVP of the Eastern states, including their host New York, was B.
Y. Morrison.

The AIS was fortunate that the founding was effected not only by
enthusiastic people, but also by thoughtful, industrious types, many of
whom were, or would become, influential in the world of horticulture. We
have mentioned some, but also there were Louise Beebe Wilder, the author
of many popular garden books and a columnist for The Garden Magazine;
Mary Helen Wingate Lloyd, of the Garden Club of America, who would
develop her famous "Iris Bowl", a remarkable garden in Pennsylvania
visited by thousands during the 1920s; and Ethel Anson S. Peckham of New
York, who managed the Bronx Park Iris Trial Gardens, and edited the
Society's 1929 and 1939 Alphabetical Iris Check Lists. Each in her time
became a Director of the AIS.

The March 1920, issues of The Garden Magazine and The Flower Grower featured long articles in Robert Sturtevant's elegant prose about the
newly formed American Iris Society. The piece in The Flower Grower,
which had been selected as house organ for the AIS, a role it would
fulfill for several years, carrying news to the members while the first Bulletins addressed important cultural and historical issues, announced
the birth of the Society and declared that it had already attracted well
over two hundred and fifty charter members. It also identified the
group’s officers and directors; described an ambitious range of proposed
projects and the progress that had already been achieved; encouraged
members and prospective members to communicate their needs and ideas to
the Secretary; and conveyed tentative details for the first annual
meeting of the AIS, planned for that June in Philadelphia.

All these remarkable developments, and, indeed, the eighty five years of
the American Iris Society and its work which have followed, were largely
made possible because on January 29, 1920, people with vision and
gumption, encouraged by the leaders of the New York Botanical Garden,
gathered in Bronx Park to meet each other and talk, to have a nice lunch
and to organize a national iris society. They came in the dead of
winter. Putting aside other business, they came on comparatively short
notice. Some traveled considerable distances from Tennessee, Virginia,
Ohio, or Quebec. They gathered to bring their combined experience and
clout to an exciting and important task, and with enthusiasm, and
cooperation, they accomplished it.

As published in the AIS Bulletin Number 338
July 2005

The Origins of the American Iris Society Check Lists by Anner M. WhiteheadAmong the goals of the American Iris Society (AIS) at its founding in
January, 1920, indeed one of the motivating forces leading to that
founding, was to confer order upon the names of the garden irises.

William Rickatson Dykes’ monograph, The
Genus Iris, published in 1913 by Cambridge University Press, was adopted
by the new society as its botanical authority, but the nomenclature of
the horticultural varieties was understood to be in disarray.

This condition had apparently prevailed at
least since 1851, when Boston nurseryman Joseph Breck in The Flower
Garden; or Breck’s Book of Flowers, commented, “There are many other
fine Iris in cultivation with which there has been such a hocus-pocus
game played by the florist, that it is impossible to tell their origin.” The muddled names in his own book confirm the validity of Breck’s
concerns.

Confusion
persisted through the latter decades of the nineteenth century, decades
in which bearded irises waned in popularity in North America and Europe
while newly discovered Iris species and the exotic Japanese irises rose
to prominence, accompanied by their own nomenclature challenges.

Then, toward the turn of the new century,
interest in hardy perennials generally began to reawaken. As irises
became an object of study and development in informed gardening circles
in the USA and abroad, it became apparent that the problem had continued
to smolder. Vernacular names abounded. Many named varieties were
remarkably similar. Some people even suggested that the situation was
exacerbated by wholesalers renaming older cultivars to meet, and fan,
the growing demand for novelties. In any case, by the second decade, it
was common knowledge that the names of many irises in trade were
dubious.

This
situation was not unique to Iris. In 1923, reflecting efforts to address
the needs of the commercial horticulture community and its customers,
the American Joint Committee on Horticultural Nomenclature published a
reference book called Standardized Plant Names. The preface to the first
edition, as quoted in the revised edition of 1942, reads:

“The American Joint
Committee on Horticultural Nomenclature was formed in 1915 by
committees of the American Association of Nurserymen and of the
Ornamental Growers Association.
“Purposes: As first constituted, the stated purpose of the Committee
was to ‘make buying easy’ by bringing about so far as practicable,
the consistent use of a single standardized ‘scientific’ name, and a
single standardized ‘common’ name for every tree, shrub, and plant
in American commerce . . .
“To establish . . . A well-organized mechanism for the registration
and identification of horticultural varieties and the adoption of
standard rules of nomenclature for the guidance of those naming
horticultural varieties.”

In 1917, this committee had
issued a Statement of the Problem in which some known causes of
confusion, ranging from learned disagreements among botanists to
concatenating errors among nurserymen, were discussed at length and the
consequences thereof stated, thus: “the plantsman and buyer become
perplexed and discouraged, and proper interest is not awakened. This
often results in the over-use of the commoner and less worthy trees and
plants, to the exclusion of many beautiful things.”

Clearly, if Iris was to be elevated to a
position of prominence commensurate with the enthusiasm of the founders
of the new American Iris Society, something earnest, authoritative, and
comprehensive was going to have to be done about the notorious names
mess, and sooner rather than later.

Many people involved in the AIS were also
associated with the American Peony Society. Beginning early in the
century, this group achieved considerable success in sorting the
confused nomenclature of the genus Paeonia, with much attention focused
on direct visual comparison of plants and blossoms grown in special test
gardens established at Cornell University. These people were mindful of
what might be accomplished for Iris, and, the Great War now behind them,
they directed their attention to the task.

In June, 1919, John C. Wister, who would
become the first president of the AIS, began compiling from diverse
sources a “check list” of the names of Iris varieties. Additions were
contributed by Robert S. Sturtevant, later the first editor of the AIS,
by the distinguished nurseryman E. H. Krelage of the Netherlands, who
had inherited a remarkable collection of horticultural ephemera, and
many others. The working “check list,” maintained in typewritten form,
eventually went through six revisions.

In January, 1922, a version of the revised
list comprised solely of the names of those irises believed to be
currently in commerce, with a few known synonyms thereof, was published
by the AIS as its Bulletin Number 4. This was prepared by the Society
specifically for Standardized Plant Names, and publication to the
members was underwritten by several prominent commercial iris growers,
among them Lee Bonnewitz of Ohio, Jennett Dean of California, Bertrand
Farr of Pennsylvania, Grace Sturtevant of Massachusetts, the Peterson
Nursery of Chicago, and the Rainbow Iris Gardens of Minnesota.

Additions and corrections to Bulletin Number
4 were solicited from its readers, and, these having been mulled and
culled, the final revision was published in October, 1923, as AIS Bulletin Number 8, formatted as it had appeared in Standardized Plant
Names.

The 1920s were
a productive decade. New, genetically complex, modern irises were
introduced into trade by hybridizers in the USA and abroad.
Classification systems for Iris were debated, especially at the first
International Conference on the Iris, convened in Paris in 1922.
Consensus in this matter would prove elusive, but the AIS proceeded
purposefully forward. Seminal publications geared toward the general
reader also appeared, notably USDA Farmers’ Bulletin 1406: Garden
Irises, by B. Y. Morrison (1926), Ella Porter McKinney’s Iris in the
Little Garden (1927), and John C. Wister’s The Iris (1927). AIS test
gardens were planted, and the process of sorting out and evaluating
cultivars, new and old, began.

The AIS also established a Registrar’s
office, with Charles Gersdorff as Registrar, and Ethel Anson S. Peckham
as Recorder. They sent forth a flurry of correspondence inquiring about
the histories of nurseries, hybridizers, and irises. A reference
collection of commercial catalogs was assembled, and books and
periodicals in private collections and horticultural libraries were
pored over for all meaningful references to Iris, some dating to the
Renaissance.

Throughout the 1920s, then, as irises rose to unprecedented popularity
in North America and Europe, among the most pressing goals of the new
AIS was to ascertain which varieties circulating under different names
were, in fact, the same plant, and to determine which, among a murky and
churning sea of Iris names were original, and thus legitimate, so that
each Iris cultivar, past, present, and future, might carry one
“approved” name which identified it uniquely.

A compilation of the fruits of the decade’s
activity appeared in 1929 as the American Iris Society Alphabetical Iris
Check List, edited by Mrs. Peckham. The book contains about twelve
thousand names of “species, forms of species, horticultural
varieties, and synonyms,” introduced by useful notes. Approved names
carry brief coded descriptions, including a reference to a color-based
classification system devised by the nurseryman F. X Schreiner of
Minnesota, which had been introduced in Wister’s book.

The intent of the Society in issuing the Check List, as explained by President Wister in his introduction, was, “to publish all that is known about Iris names that have appeared in
gardening literature during the last hundred or more years. . . . make
it so easy for those who introduce new varieties, to avoid name
duplication and confusion, that those who persist in this practice in
the future may well be branded as either ignorant, careless or
deliberate deceivers.” Moreover, he asserted, “We believe that
this present work will stand for many years as the most complete book of
reference on the Iris.”

And so it did stand as the most complete and
authoritative work of its kind until publication of the American Iris
Society 1939 Alphabetical Iris Check List, again compiled and edited by
Mrs. Peckham. This, as she tells us in her preface, contains some
nineteen thousand names, with the increase reflecting registration of
new cultivars, the fruits of ongoing research, and corrections of
earlier literature. Not surprisingly, it proved too exhaustive a
document to be included in the new Standardized Plant Names.

The 1939 Check List subsumes and corrects
the 1929 Check List. Brief, but useful, notes on hybridizers, botanists,
publications, and commercial nurseries introduce the nearly six hundred
pages of densely abbreviated material. Synonyms and muddled names are
clarified, and coded bibliographical citations, notes on awards, and
pedigrees, where known, are included. Although there are documented
errors– clerical errors, errors of fact, errors of judgment– and
probably errors as yet undiscovered, it is generally agreed that the
level of accuracy is high.

Few single volume horticultural reference
works can claim to make available so remarkable a quantity of
fascinating information as does the 1939 Alphabetical Iris Checklist. In
his introduction, Dr. Harry H. Everett, President of the AIS at its
publication, described it as “a book of high adventure in the field
of beauty, a record of hopes achieved, and a guide to Rainbow’s end.”

As the world emerged from the Second World
War, there was renewed interest in developing a standard for the naming
of garden plants, a new set of rules distinct from the International
Code of Botanical Nomenclature which serves the scientific community. In
1952, William T. Stearn, representing the Royal Horticultural Society at
the International Botanical Congress in Sweden, proposed such a
standard, and, in 1953, The International Code of Nomenclature for
Cultivated Plants was published.

The Code is administered as voluntary treaty
under the aegis of the United Nations’ commerce committee, with
designated groups or individuals in participating countries overseeing
specific plant genera, or portions thereof. These groups and individuals
are the International Cultivar Registration Authorities.

In 1955, the AIS, having long demonstrated
its commitment to maintaining “a well-organized mechanism for the
registration and identification of horticultural varieties,” was
asked to accept the responsibility of serving as International Cultivar
Registration Authority for all non-bulbous cultivars of the genus Iris,
an honor it carries to this day.

Please note: The
AIS Check Lists are available to purchase through the AIS Storefront
section of the AIS website. For full details on these publications please go to the AIS Storefront.

AIS CHECK LISTS: Each of these are books that provide a ten year compilation of
iris registrations and introductions (R&I).
1939 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1930-1939.
1949 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1940-1949.
1959 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1950-1959.
1969 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1960-1969.
1979 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1970-1979.1989 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1980-1989.1999 Ten year compilation of registrations, 1990-1999

For 2000 to current the registration information is
published yearly as single year Registrations and Introductions booklets for reference use until the
next 10 year compilation is published.

The American Iris Seal by Anner M. Whitehead

Just as an individual has a written
signature which he or she affixes to documents to signify authorship,
personal approval, or legal assent, so an organization, like the
American Iris Society, which conducts its business through the actions
of a Board of Directors, has a Seal, which serves as its signature.

The physical presence of the official Seal
signifies the legal presence of the organization. The Seal may indicate
accord or approval, or it may indicate that an action has been taken, or
a document published, under the authority of the organization. The legal
potency of a Seal distinguishes this unique category of graphic image
from a commercial trademark, a corporate logo, or a purely decorative
motif.

Over
the years, the signature of the American Iris Society has taken two
handsome and distinct forms. Each version of the AIS Seal arose during a
period of vigorous growth, and each might be said to reflect the
Society’s self image and public posture at the time of its adoption.

The first AIS Seal was introduced by B. Y.
Morrison in the January, 1929 issue of the Bulletin of the American
Iris Society. It was featured on the title page of the 1929 American Iris Society Alphabetical Iris Check List, and again on
that of the 1939 Check List. It was still in use in 1947, when it
appeared in The Iris: An Ideal Hardy Perennial, the first book
published by the AIS to promote garden irises, and it appeared on the
title page of the 1949 Alphabetical Iris Check List.

John C. Wister, sitting President of the AIS
at the time of the Seal’s first appearance, did not discuss the Seal in
his historical accounts of the early days of the Society; however, Mr.
Morrison’s account from the January, 1929 Bulletin, “The Making
of the Seal,” is instructive:

Before planning the design of the seal for the Society,
an effort was made to collect material which would relate to the Iris in
mythology and art in special relation to design. The old myth of Iris,
the messenger of the gods, furnishes the rainbow symbol, and the history
of France the conventional fleur-de-lys figure [.
. . .] Aside from this, there is little to be
found in conventionalized design, although almost portrait-like figures
appear in Persian miniatures, in Persian ceramics, in French tapestries
and in Japanese bronzes, inlays, wood carvings and textiles.

Considered purely from the basis of
design, the Iris flower, which is strongly three-parted, suggests the
triangle both in silhouette and plan. This makes a difficult relation to
the conventional circular pattern of the seal and necessitated a further
search for ideas which would be related to Iris lore and history.

Among
the old garden books known to the writer is a copy of the “Herbolario
Volgare,” in which the illustrations, apparently woodcuts, have a
singular force and beauty from the great simplification which was
necessary in cutting the blocks. In this is an extremely decorative
figure which was used both for the Iris and the rush (acorus). The
same block appears in other herbals [. . . .] The book itself is a translation of an earlier German “Herbarius,” of
which the first known dated edition is from Mainz in 1484. There were
many later editions and some translations [. . . .]

At any rate the figure in the Italian edition was used to
furnish the main part of our design and represents undoubtedly an apogon
iris, probably Iris pseudacorus. The drawing has been modified very
slightly to fit the circular form and the stork wading in the
conventional waves has been omitted. The highly conventional rendering
of the flowers is interesting in that in some there is an approximation
of the conventional French design of the “fleur de lys” [. . . .] The rainbow symbol is
carried in the seven-banded border which surrounds the upper part of the
seal.

From these details, freely borrowed, the
writer, as a “compiler” rather than as a “designer” has made the seal
illustrated, believing that they are more interesting than any pattern
he might invent or any symbolism that he might create and that this
conventional treatment is more suited to the purposes of the design than
the more life-like representations that are so often used.

It is entirely characteristic of the early
AIS that the first Seal should involve a graphic image of great
antiquity, and interesting provenance. Many prominent members were
engaged with the genus on an intellectual, and an artistic level. Grace
Sturtevant, the early hybridizer, was also a trained botanical
illustrator who grew up with the remarkable collection of pre-Linnaean
botanical literature formed by her distinguished father, Dr. E. L.
Sturtevant. Her younger brother, Robert, was a landscape architect, much
interested in subtle coloristic effects in the garden. J. Marion Shull’s Rainbow Fragments: A Garden Book of the Iris, 1931, was
illustrated with the author’s own paintings of individual Iris cultivars. Ethel A. S. Peckham's watercolor studies of beardless Iris species garnered her a Gold Medal from the British Iris Society. While
the paintings by Mrs. Horatio Gates Lloyd, an AIS Director from 1921 to
1930 famous for the immense “Iris Bowl” in her garden in Pennsylvania,
could not be called noteworthy, her collection of antiquarian
horticultural literature unquestionably was.

“The fairies that stood sponsor at the
birth of B. Y. Morrison must have been in doubt as to what special gift
they should bestow on him, so to give him a choice they placed within
his reach, art, music, literature and science. Whereupon he grasped them
all and refused to part with any of them.”

Having earned a Master’s Degree in Landscape
Architecture from Harvard in 1915, Benjamin Yoe Morrison traveled for a
year in the Far East, studying Japanese art and architecture.
Subsequently, he joined the Bureau of Plant Industry of the United
States Department of Agriculture. A superior draftsman who illustrated
his own Garden Irises: U. S. Department of Agriculture Farmers’
Bulletin No. 1406, published in 1926 with an image derived from a
Renaissance source on the cover, he also created the sophisticated
woodcuts of botanical subjects which for many years graced the journal
of the American Horticultural Society, of which he served both as
President, and the longtime Editor. In the 1930s, he served as Secretary
and Editor of the AIS. A plant hybridizer of renown, he was also the
designer and first director of the United States National Arboretum.

These remarkable people, and other early
members of the Society, were interested in Iris history, and in
the literature thereof. Mrs. Peckham undertook investigations to
document the manifold origins of the fleur-de-lys motif. The early Bulletins, edited by Robert Sturtevant, presented not only Society
business and discussions of new cultivars and scientific advances of the
day, but also articles on the history of garden irises, including those
as ancient as Gerard's Great Herball, of 1597. Dr. Krelage, a
much respected nurseryman in the Netherlands, contributed a seminal
article, “The Development of the Tall Bearded Iris in the 19th Century.” Not surprisingly, in a period when Colonial Revival herb
gardens were a horticultural rage in North America, the role of Iris in perfumery and early European medicine also received attention.
Clearly, those members whose contributions provided much of the impetus
for the AIS’s remarkable growth during the first decade of its existence
intended the Society to support historical research as well as
scientific study, education, and the development and personal enjoyment
of modern hybrid irises.

It is in this context that Mr. Morrison,
working within the traditional circular format, combined a primitive
scientific representation of a water iris from an archaic Continental
herbal, and an abstract motif representing the Rainbow, the emblem of
Iris the Messenger and an internationally recognized symbol of a future
bright with hope, to create the Society’s first Seal.

The later Seal was developed in the middle
years of the twentieth century, during that vital period of rapidly
expanding activity following the grim hiatus of World War II in which
the AIS optimistically reinvented itself as a horticultural
organization.

In these years, the Society accepted the
responsibility for serving as the International Cultivar Registration
Authority for all non-bulbous cultivars of the genus Iris, which
honor enhanced its public profile worldwide, and necessitated
organizational changes. A formal classification system for the garden
irises was established, and the Awards system was revised. Special
interest groups emerged from within the Society to provide members
attracted to one or another category of iris greater opportunities for
interaction with like-minded enthusiasts. Work also began on Garden
Irises, the Society’s second major book on the subject, edited by
Dr. L. F. Randolph of Cornell University, which was published in 1959.

In October, 1957 Marion Walker, then
President of the AIS, noted in the Bulletin that members were
expressing interest in the Society having a seal. He observed that, in
fact, the AIS already had one, although it been “overlooked in
recent years.” He also announced that a committee had been formed to “make better use of the AIS Seal.” The published record is short on
details, but, over the next few months, this committee’s directive
apparently changed, so that, ultimately, their task was to recommend a
design for a new official Seal to the AIS’s Board of Directors for
approval.

Hubert A. Fischer, who would in 1963 become
the eleventh President of the Society, was the Chairman of the Seal
Committee. A prominent wholesale dealer of precious gems in Chicago, a
philanthropist, and an internationally renowned horticulturist whose
extensive personal gardens at his estate in Hinsdale, Illinois, were
spectacular by any standard, he was uniquely suited to a project the
successful resolution of which required a judicious balancing of
diplomacy and sensibility.

“I was appointed the head of a committee to design an
official seal for the Society. This seemed a simple assignment until
sketches and suggestions were received. It should be a tall bearded; it
should be a beardless; [. . .] one sketch included a half dozen types. I realized that
the design must be kept in simple form, so I asked my brother, a
newspaper artist, to design a seal to represent an iris but of no
definite type. The result was a design of modernistic form, but not too
far out. Of the number submitted for final selection, it was chosen with
a few minor changes.”

These minor changes were apparently effected
at the 1958 Annual AIS Convention in Syracuse, New York. Speaking in the
July, 1958 Bulletin, Marion Walker supplied an intriguing detail: “The drawing was prepared by the committee in cooperation with the
artist at the Bailey Hortorium at Cornell.”

Neither artist’s name appears in the record,
and Hubert Fischer’s artist brother’s name remains a mystery; however,
in 1958, the staff artist of the Liberty Hyde Bailey Hortorium at
Cornell University was Miss Mitsu Nakayama, who, interestingly, is also
credited with drafting the Hortorium’s emblem.

Among the AIS members in New York State was
Dr. George H. M. Lawrence, the distinguished taxonomist who would become
the founding Director of what is now the Hunt Institute for Botanical
Documentation at Carnegie-Mellon University. At the time, Dr. Lawrence,
who also contributed to the development of the AIS’s new classification
system, was serving as the Director of the Hortorium, having succeeded
his teacher, Dr. Liberty Hyde Bailey, in the position. It seems likely
that it was Dr. Lawrence who brought the members of the Seal Committee,
and his staff artist, together.

The Fischer-Nakayama design features a
remarkably dynamic and graceful representation of a generic iris,
presumptively Mr. Fischer’s work, framed by, but not confined within, a
well-proportioned oval cartouche bearing the name of the Society. The
double exterior line delimiting the border of the oval, distinctively
paired with a single interior line, and the inclusion of the founding
date of the Society within the field of the Seal, resemble the Bailey’s
emblem, and thus may be attributable, in whole or part, to Miss
Nakayama.

Approved by the AIS’s Board of Directors on
June 4, 1958, the new Seal made its official debut in Garden Irises,
albeit with the founding date stated incorrectly. The abstract, or, as
Mr. Morrison would say, “conventional,” iris motif has also
enjoyed a graphic life independent of the Seal, as a decorative motif.

Whereas the first Seal featured a
sophisticated image, one of great dignity, but unquestionably arcane,
the American Iris Society’s new Seal was a triumph of lucidity. With its
elegant proportions, and engaging simplicity, it remains as powerful
today as when first adopted fifty years ago as the signature of an
organization then stepping forth eagerly to bring its message to the
modern horticultural world.